


Tail

by TheGrinningKitten



Series: His Story [4]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Annihilator!Error, Backstory for the Trio, Body Horror, Friendship, Gen, Includes Mentions of All Sorts of Creepy Stuff Like, Mutilations, Negative!Dream, Past Abuse, Past Rape/Non-con, Scar!Ink, Tail!Error, Trauma, Zero Infinity, nothing - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-28
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-14 00:21:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29659569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheGrinningKitten/pseuds/TheGrinningKitten
Summary: A note from the translator:"His Story" is actually a series of stories in nature. However, originally, all of its stories were posted as one single fic, but due to AO3's capabilities, the translated stories are separated into actual fics under the same series.The preface by the author (which was originally a separate chapter) is available onthe main page of the "His Story" series.Thank you for your attention and enjoy!
Relationships: Dream & Error & Ink
Series: His Story [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2124066
Comments: 17
Kudos: 56





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * A translation of [Его история (История 4 - Хвост)](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/765534) by Elena Troitskaya (Sariko). 



> **A note from the translator:**
> 
> "His Story" is actually a series of stories in nature. However, originally, all of its stories were posted as one single fic, but due to AO3's capabilities, the translated stories are separated into actual fics under the same series.
> 
> The preface by the author (which was originally a separate chapter) is available on [the main page of the "His Story" series](https://archiveofourown.org/series/2124066).
> 
> Thank you for your attention and enjoy!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: mentions of body horror, general creepiness.
> 
> Special thanks to [Neutralcybertrn](https://twitter.com/Neutralcybertrn) for beta-reading this chapter!

They were trekking through the darkness. A pathlighter Chara illuminated their way. A pathlighter like them was a rarity. Frisks and Charas rarely ended up in Zero Infinity, and if they did, they were rarely inclined to give up their souls to serve the light. So the two travellers spent a part of their journey discussing the reasons that pushed Charas to become pathlighters, and reminiscing about the times they crossed paths with this type of unfriendly humans.

Negative and Scar weren’t wayfarers. They considered themselves revellers and jokers, who knew nothing sweeter than to visit a cluster or two to see what life was like there, stir up some trouble if things got boring, then settle to watch their favorite “series”. They were the common residents of Zero Infinity who’d managed to adjust to its ever-changing lifestyle. They were absolutely cool with lacking any sort of important goal in their lives and never tried to search for one, enjoying their freedom.

They started this journey through the darkness for the sake of going on a journey. So they walked, talked and didn’t look around much. What did they care about the other pathlighter and their charges, who passed them by now and again? Those people had their own stories that _didn’t involve them_.

And so they walked, until they literally stumbled over a living being.

“Why the hell are you lying around here?” Scar was quick to snap, and only then anger gave way to surprise. How could there be anyone _alive_ lying here, if they didn’t have the pathlighter’s light to keep them safe? The amalgamation should’ve devoured them a long time ago.

And if this was a wayfarer lying on the ground, then now was a good time to turn tail and run. If they actually _fell asleep_ in such an inopportune place, who knew how dangerous and murderous they could be?

However, the stranger took their time getting up and making their indignation be known — as in, they didn’t do that at all. Why? Well, the answer was revealed when Scar and Negative took a closer look at them. The poor guy’s legs were petrified up to their knees.

“Is this an Error?” Negative asked, unsure.

“Yep, yet another Error.” Scar grimaced: he hated the black skeletons. His fingers subconsciously touched his mangled eye-socket.

There really was an Error sitting in front of the travellers — but a weird kind of Error: too thin, taller than they were used to, and he had a long tail that was lifelessly lying on the ground. He didn’t take offence to how rude they were being — didn’t show any emotions at all. Bent and broken, he was silently turning to stone.

Except normally the process took mere minutes — and yet this guy, apparently, had been sitting here for hours. Maybe even days. Maybe even years.

Something else didn’t add up: The light of the lantern didn’t affect the stone crust. And that’s considering that normally, pathlighters would free people from the stone — if that was still possible — and lead them towards the habitable areas. If the poor souls agreed to come, that is.

“Hey! How are you, pal?” Scar put as much distaste into saying “pal” as it was possible. He got no response, so he forced the Error’s head up, looked into the other’s eye-sockets and shuddered. The gaze he was met with was pained, exhausted and pleading.

What exactly it was pleading for remained unknown. Maybe it was for a quick death, or maybe it was for a blessed salvation.

Negative crouched next to the Error and examined the spot where the stone legs met the ground.

“He grew into the ground,” was Negative’s shocking discovery. A closer look also revealed that the stone hadn't claimed a single inch in the last couple of minutes, so, surprised, he said: “I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like this before.”

Scar let go of the Error’s head, and it hung low again, as if there were no vertebrae to keep it upright.

“Pathetic.” Scar grimaced. He looked around. “Are there any habitable areas around here?”

Negative too looked around, intrigued: “I doubt it. At least, I haven’t heard of any.”

“Then where did he come from?”

“Perhaps this is the place his world dumped him into?”

“Perhaps.”

Both looked at the Error and had the same thought: he didn’t look like a newbie. There was something about this Error — something that only occurred in people who’d been living in Zero Infinity for a long while.

“Maybe he’s a wayfarer?” Scar walked around Error and instantly answered his own question: “Nah, wayfarers can’t become pathlighters or turn to stone. Can they?”

“Maybe we simply don’t know all there is to know about wayfarers?” Negative noted. He was just as intrigued by this anomalous Error. “Either way, whatever is happening to him, it isn’t normal.”

They circled around the anomalous Error a little longer, then sat down beside him, tying Chara down close to him as well. Perhaps the human would be able to reinvigorate the guy, and then he’d talk to them, tell them something interesting.

But the Error kept sinking into despair, remaining silent. The stone shackles on his feet resisted the light.

Everything about this was extremely odd.

“Maybe this is Zero Infinity glitching out?” Negative suggested with a chuckle. “The poor thing has been eating way too many Errors.”

The joke tickled Scar’s funny bone, and he burst out laughing.

“Nothing is impossible.”

“So what are we going to do about this?” Negative gave the hunched black skeleton an appraising look.

“Do we _have to_ do a thing about this?”

“We don’t, thank the Void. But aren’t you curious how this guy ended up in such a state? What if he’s special? A new kind of creature?”

Scar shrugged: “I’m not that curious. All wayfarers end up as something strange sooner or later. And wayfarer Errors end up sick in the head to boot!

“Take Annihilator, for example. He was your regular Error, then he started tailing Nothing — and now he’s banned every habitable area. He’s got an aura to match Nothing’s too. Or take Butterfly? We’re lucky we managed to escape from that cluster: there’s nothing but butterflies left there now. That’s a thing straight out of horror movies! And Dollmaker—”

“There’s two of them. Which one are you talking about?”

“The one who sewed himself an Ink out of body parts!”

“Yeah, that’s horror movie material for sure.”

“The other one isn’t any better.” Scar cringed. “And I think they call him Master of Souls now, to avoid confusion. Either way, when a doll gets sewn together to house a recreated soul inside it — that is _not_ a pretty sight. There’s also—”

“I get it, I get it,” Negative interrupted. “All Errors are living problems. I know. But you still haven’t told me what we’re going to do about this one.”

Scar growled and fixed the black skeleton with a murderous look. A large fountain pen appeared in his hands, and he held its pointy end against the black skull.

Negative watched him do that, intrigued: “Are you going to check if he’s immortal?” he decided to clarify.

“If he dies, then he really _is_ special.” An evil grin stretched over Scar’s face. However, the weapon didn’t strike after all. “Damnit, he’s not even listening to us, as if he’s some kind of a pathlighter!”

The sharp tip of the pen poked the floor at the Error’s feet. Scar attempted to use the art supply as a shovel, but the ground of Zero Infinity remained unbreakable.

“What if we cut him away at ground level?” Scar suggested after a minute or two of useless scratching.

“Yeah, better yet, let’s snap off his legs… Wait! Are you suggesting we add a black ballast to our life?” Negative asked, surprised.

Scar had actually surprised himself with that suggestion. He hated Errors after all — so why was he running in circles around this one?

“Let’s assume you piqued my curiosity,” Scar said dismissively and pulled the Chara even closer. “Hey, Error! Either you liven up, or we’ll cut your tail off!” In order to back up his words, he took the long, lithe limb into his hands and pulled it taut, checking how long it was.

Negative moved closer, almost touching his forehead to the Error’s, and suddenly asked: “Scar, quit threatening him. I think he’s been through enough already.”

“What do you suggest I do then? Dance for him?”

“I suggest you try being nice to him,” Negative said with an eerie grin on his face and almost burst out laughing at the expression his friend made. “Well, if you really want to take this deadweight with you, then I think the only way to pull him out of the stone is to instill hope in his soul. It worked for me.”

Scar shuddered. They never discussed their past since both of them had it filled with troubles and bad decisions. Scar brought his world to its doom with his very own hands, when he let anger reign over him. Negative killed his own brother and ate his soul — the black apple — in an attempt to preserve the balance. It did nothing to help the balance — and that’s putting it mildly.

This guy’s story was probably about as grim as theirs.

“Fine.” Scar rubbed his forehead and sighed heavily. “How about I fuck him nicely? In some Multiverses we’re lovers and fuck like rabbits. What if he’s so glum because he lost his lover?”

“I hope you’re joking.” Negative crossed his arms.

“Of course I am! But still? What do you mean by ‘being nice’?”

Negative sat down next to the Error and wrapped his tentacles around him, like Cthulhu around a sinking ship. He focused, trying to remember how to grant positivity to people, and said, “Try to inspire good memories inside him—”

“And if there are none?”

“Just give it a try! And I’ll force him to keep thinking about them. This should help.”

Scar fixed his friend with a baffled look, as if the other had suddenly turned into a rainbow pony.

“Yeah, bringing positivity into the masses is _surely_ my calling.” And yet, in spite of all the misgivings and reluctance to do something like this, Scar sat down beside the Error and started to talk to him. His speech was rough and unsure at first, but slowly it grew easier and lighter.

He talked about everything but tried to stick to good things for the most part. It took some effort, but he remembered how he used to be an optimistic skeleton with a strong desire to share his positivity with people. Remembered trying to earn his Error’s trust and become his friend. And even though this story was marred by the horrifying wound and slow loss of optimism, he still remembered that it was his Error who brought him to a doctor back then — and the glitch never liked looking at the crack that split his enemy’s eye-socket either. An eternal reminder.

“If only he found it in him to apologize, everything would’ve ended differently,” Scar said, voice tinged with sadness. He didn’t immediately notice that the Error wasn’t sitting limply like a broken doll anymore. He was holding his head up just a little, tilting it to stare at the white skeleton’s scarred eye-socket with pity in his eyes. This Error’s eye-sockets were both the same size, their shape tapering into a slight point at the sides, and his eyelights turned out to be bright red. They looked like smoldering embers, ready to burn everyone around to ashes should someone fan the flames.

“No matter which way you look at it, you don’t look anything like my Error even with your eyes closed.”

The tiniest of smiles graced the black skeleton’s face. He didn’t at all want to look like the skeleton who left so many wounds — both physical and mental — on the person who was so kind to him in this moment.

“Good. See, even inside this nightmare there’s a place for something good to happen. Take me for example! I lost everything and everyone, but then I met Negative, and we’ve been inseparable ever since. If it wasn’t for him, I would’ve finally broken down or gave into anger. Ha! It’s kinda funny, isn’t it? The prince of negativity-slash-positivity himself is holding me back from crossing that line. I think I’ve struck the balance and found zen. Heh!

“So you’ll be okay too. After the mountains of shit there’s always a steep descent into “The Valley of Happiness”, where there are rainbows everywhere, and… Dear god, is this crap really coming out of my mouth? Well, let’s call it “The Valley of Not-Quite-Shit-and-Fleeting-Joys”. That’s closer to the truth.”

Scar turned to Negative for support. He’d already relayed his whole life story to the Error, and he had nothing else to talk about. Negative nodded towards the Error encouragingly, as if to say, _Keep going, you’re almost there._

“So, maybe you could come with us? I promise, we won’t let you get hurt. Let’s be friends?” Scar held out his hand — just the way he used to do back in his world for his own Error. The difference was that this Error took his hand.

The other’s palm was warm and rough, its bones surprisingly thin and a little pointy at the ends.

Suddenly, the Error’s eyelights vanished, and he collapsed onto Scar. The stone crust shedded off his legs.

Negative laughed at Scar’s surprised expression: “Grab your princess and let’s go.”

“He makes a pretty crappy princess.” Scar made a face and shifted the Error to hold him a bit more comfortably. He was surprised by how little the other weighed and how thin his bones looked.

“Then quit staring at him.”

Scar growled something unintelligible, threw the “princess” onto his shoulder like a bag of potatoes and resumed his journey.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: mentions of torture, rape, body horror and general creepiness.
> 
> Special thanks to [Neutralcybertrn](https://twitter.com/Neutralcybertrn) for beta-reading this chapter!

They kept walking for a long while — and the Error showed no signs of being alive the whole time. If anything, he made a convincing impression of a bag of despair that had zero interest in where he was being taken.

“Scar, why do you want him, and what do you intend to do with him?”

“I have no idea. On both parts. I’m hoping to figure it out as I go. I’m much more curious about what kind of creature he is, if he neither got eaten by the amalgamation, nor got petrified. So until I figure this out, I’ll be taking care of him.”

Negative shook his head: “That’s one hell of a stray kitten to keep. Don’t forget that owning pets involves cleaning up after them — and Errors tend to generate a lot of shit.”

“You’re thinking too far ahead,” Scar said. “Perhaps, all of our efforts will amount to nothing, and he turns into one of the frozen ones. As you can see, he’s far from lively.” He made a face, adjusting his hold on the skeleton he was carrying.

The residential area of the cluster greeted them with a lot of racket. The residents were all shouting as they ran about in a panic.

Negative flared his tentacles at the abundance of negative emotions. He caught a random resident and forced the reason for the commotion out of them:

“Nothing!”

A single name — and it all made sense. Negative and Scar relaxed and waded through the panicked crowds, searching for a hotel or something of the sort.

“It’s the same thing every time,” Scar hissed, dodging yet another running resident. “Everyone’s panicking and screaming and evacuating the place — as if Nothing gives a damn about any of them.”

“You sound as if you’re not scared of him,” Negative chuckled.

“Of course I’m scared of him. Well, not of him, but of his aura. Whenever he’s close, it feels as if something lifted me only to drop me back down. And then I spend another week feeling as if there’s a bottomless pit where my soul is. But he never harms any residents — apart from a few exceptions. It was he who dealt with Butterfly, when things got out of hand, after all.”

“These fools are just scared of the unknown. Everyone’s still unsure what kind of creature he is. Well, perhaps, Annihilator knows.”

“But it’s not like we can ask him. I wonder if they’re rivals or friends?”

“Those aren’t mutually exclusive.” Scar shrugged.

The hotel looked like a memory of an apartment building. They were greeted by a bot Asgore, who smiled as he handed them the keys to a free apartment on the tenth floor. The elevator was working, thankfully.

They were almost at the door, when they came across a Lust.

“Wanna have some fun?” he suggested half-heartedly.

“We already have someone to keep us company.” Scar moved the Error into the hold of his friend’s tentacles, turned the key in the lock and opened the door.

“You might want to change the scenery and the activities you engage in.” Negative pointed a tentacle at the Lust. “Unless you start doing something else, you risk becoming a bot. And a prostitute bot is even worse than a sex robot, trust me.”

Instead of answering, the Lust lit up a cigarette and breathed out a cloud of white smoke.

The friends found themselves in a cosy apartment that had a kitchen, a bedroom and a bathroom. The benefits of having a bed were easy to see even for a resident of Zero Infinity (it was comfy to read books while lying in one), but why would anyone here need a kitchen? An inspection of the kitchen cabinets revealed a lone cockroach. It was big and red, with long antennae — and it was instantly smashed under Scar’s hand. Only it didn’t die. Quite routinely, it reformed from its splattered state and twitched its antennae, as if to say, _Well, are you satisfied?_

“Ew!” Scar shut the cabinet door, leaving the cockroach alone. “I do wonder how this thing ended up in Zero Infinity. Wouldn’t that be hilarious, if this cockroach is the only survivor of its Multiverse? Imagine a world that decided to save a cockroach instead of yet another guardian or destroyer! Come to think of it, that’s a pretty good decision on its part.”

Negative laughed at the joke and set their newly acquired charge down on the king-size bed. The Error still acted like a fresh corpse — one that didn’t stink yet, but didn’t respond to questions anymore. He kept staring at the ceiling with an empty look in his eyes.

“Okay.” Negative sat down on the edge of the bed. “So what’s the plan?”

“There is no plan.” Scar sat down on the other side of the bed and examined the Error. “There is an idea though. We’ll keep on dragging his positive emotions to the surface: This got him to react to things back in the darkness. Maybe that’ll snap him out of this.”

“What if I absorb his negative feelings?”

The friends shared a thoughtful look and simultaneously turned to stare at the depressive _something_.

“Either way, we’ve got nothing to lose, and neither does he. Let’s give it a try.”

At the first taste of the Error’s emotions, Negative choked: “Nah, screw that. This thing’s only good for making poisons.”

“It’s that bad?” Scar asked, surprised.

“Even worse.” Negative got to his feet and pointed all of his tentacles at the Error. Along with the taste of emotions, he absorbed a chunk of the other’s memories and discovered the horrifying truth. “He was trying to force Zero Infinity to kill him!”

This revelation pulled the rug from under their feet. Sure, there had always been those who got sick of eternal existence in the space between the Multiverses. Those people would walk into the darkness to be devoured by the amalgamation or turn to stone — or they would freeze without leaving the light. Sometimes they ended up in alternate Multiverses and killed themselves there, though this solution failed at times. Once a resident became a wayfarer, killing them turned into a challenge.

“But he’s got to be a wayfarer, right?”

“I’m not so sure.” The next revelation came as a shock: “I think he stepped further — or he’s ready to take the final step towards the change — but for whatever reason he tried to commit suicide instead.”

A chill ran over the room, slipping under their clothes and touching their souls, forcing them to shrink under the onslaught of unpleasant thoughts.

“I don’t like this,” Scar said without clarifying what exactly he disliked about their current situation. All of a sudden he didn’t feel comfortable sharing the room with this living mystery. Wayfarers were always a gamble, and the ones who took a step forward got even weirder. Of course, a lot of them performed important tasks that they granted themselves — but there were others, those who chose a terrifying path that claimed the lives of the residents of Zero Infinity.

Sure, living in Zero Infinity made it impossible to die — but that didn’t stop those weirdos. The last time the friends had an encounter with such a psycho, was when they came across the infamous Butterfly. Another Error. He started his path as a peaceful stylist, but slowly something changed inside him, and he soon found his purpose in making everyone beautiful but turning them into butterflies. The people who survived that cluster flinched at the sight of winged insects for a long while.

And there was also that Ink who took the path of an amalgamation, turning everyone into a part of his body, though he hunted strictly inside Multiverses, targeting their Inks and Errors in particular. Everyone ignored him as long as that’s the way he entertained himself — but then he finally lost it for good and started to devour the residents of Zero Infinity.

The terrifying creature deserved a terrifying demise. He was lured into one of the Multiverses, where they blew him up with a nuclear missile. After it was over, the Ink of that Multiverse spent ages running around with an erase in hand and wiping away the remains of that creature.

A Papyrus also came to mind — one who kept trying to find himself a perfect brother. He discovered a small habitable area and built a literal prison there. He caught various Sanses inside it to check if they were fit to be his brother — meaning, he tortured them. He completely lost it in the end, becoming one with the prison.

Scar had the “pleasure” of visiting that “sanatorium” back before he met Negative, and he could say in full confidence that he knew what the most terrifying haunted house ever looked like.

The person currently lying on the bed could turn out to be one of such psychos.

“Okay, that’s enough scares for now. Time to get to work. We need to wake this sleeping beauty up.”

Negative didn’t attempt to consume the emotions of this Error again, restricting his influence to pulling the positive emotions up to the surface — and Scar spent an eternity talking to him. He repeated himself, stumbled over words, but kept talking for who knew how long.

Time didn’t exist in Zero Infinity. At all. It was never conceived and never created.

The Error wasn’t in a rush to reward them with conversations, intelligent questions or any other mental activity. He spent most of the time in a daze, staring at a single spot in space, which made him very reminiscent of the frozen ones. He had moments of clarity sometimes though, and in those moments he twisted and turned in bed like a cat, trying to find a comfortable position to lie in. He also deigned to ask them a very strange question once, while remaining beyond the veil of sleep:

“Who am I?”

The question had them stumped. One: They had no idea who he was. Two: In Zero Infinity, it was impossible to lose your memory — through physical or mental trauma, at least. Though there were rumors of monsters capable of eating others’ memories.

“Ah, who the hell knows?!” Scar snapped. “You can tell us that yourself once you wake up.”

That’s how they lived for a while. They opened dimensional windows to various closed Multiverses to watch other people live their lives, pestered their nameless charge in attempts to bring him back to awareness, and took turns going for walks, where they gathered rumors to discuss later.

‘They say, in this cluster, pathlighters go missing a lot these days,” Negative said as he entered the apartment.

“Where do they go?”

“You won’t believe it. The dwellers of the Multiverses are grabbing them like hotcakes.”

“Wait, what? What would they need pathlighters for?”

“It’s rumored they can be brought back to life and forced to work for the good of the worlds.” Negative flexed his tentacles like a porn movie octopus and added: “And if the abductees don’t regain awareness, they still make great sex dolls. Producing kids that share the abilities of the missing character, tends to solve problems as well.”

Scar threw up ink and hurried to summon his fountain pen to clean up the mess. Normally, he was indifferent to sex, but the idea of stealing such an essential resource for such a lowly cause evoked a wave of fury inside hi soul.

Though what did he care? That’s just how this cluster’s story went.

After having a laugh at his friend’s expense, Negative sat down at the edge of the bed and once again attempted to awaken the positive emotions within the Error. And it actually worked this time.

“Wanna know something else?”

“If it makes me puke again, then no.”

“The Error woke up.”

In reality, the first thing to wake up was his tail. It slowly curled towards his legs only to swiftly straighten out and strike the blanket, nearly hitting Negative.

Scar instantly leaned over their charge, staring into the surprised face, where two red eyes lit up like torches.

“Good morning,” Scar blurted out. “You’ve been asleep for a _really_ long time.”

Error sat up, looked at his saviors, his eyes wide with astonishment, and asked: “Who’re you?”

“I’m Scar. He’s Negative.”

This answer must’ve done little to clear things up because the Error winced and, perplexed, mumbled: “And who am I?”

Scar felt a prickle of disappointment: He’d been hoping to hear an entertaining story straight from the mouth of the wayfarer — or whatever he was now? — fresh from the coma. Though perhaps the confusion was only temporary, and the Error just needed a little push before he remembered everything.

“One: You’re a Sans. Two: You’re an Error. Three: You haven’t introduced yourself yet. We found you in the darkness. Rejoice.”

The Error didn’t look overjoyed though. He looked from one skeleton to the other in confusion, struggling to organize his scattered thoughts. He tried to remember himself as a Sans, as an Error or as something else — but all of his memories seemed to have been wiped by amnesia.

With great difficulty, he realized he wasn’t home — and that he had no home to speak of anymore — but he couldn’t remember how he ended up in such a predicament. He also kept thinking of trust — or rather, about being unable to trust anyone. Someone must’ve betrayed him in the past — but he blanked out on who did that to him and why.

The Error remained sitting on the bed while Scar and Negative got to their feet and stepped away to discuss the situation in whispers.

“What do you think?” Scar asked.

“I think it’s a defence mechanism. He made himself forget. I guess, this guy’s past was about as good as Runner’s.”

“How could you even compare them?” Scar made a face. He thought of the mutilated madman in tattered clothes, who was doomed for all eternity to run through the darkness from one residential area to another.

“Why not? No one knows what Runner’s past was like — just like no one knows what this Error has been through.”

They’d tried asking around, but whenever they mentioned a black skeleton with a tail, everyone claimed that they’d “never seen anyone like that.”

Scar and Negative couldn’t boast ever seeing anyone like him either. Well, there were Blaster AUs, but those had skulls to match — and this Error looked nothing like them.

The friends had never seen anyone like this in any of the clusters they’d gone through — which meant that this skeleton must’ve come from afar.

“What if he originates from a boundary cluster? And came here on foot! But if so, just how long has he been living in Zero Infinity?”

“A long while.” Negative could hardly imagine such a long path. “But maybe he’s simply native to a dying cluster. After all, when a cluster dies, the corresponding chunk of Zero Infinity vanishes from existence, taking its habitable areas and residents with it.”

Scar shivered at the memory.

_He once got to experience the sensation of the nearing end. Even Nothing had nothing on that terror. But what horrified him the most were the faces of the people who were walking into the dying cluster. They were filled with desperate joy and insanity._

_Scar and Negative had to practically shove their way through the crowds of the people who wanted to disappear. The crowd kept growing. Soon the friends were drowning in the stream of monsters and humans, dragged back with the flow. That’s when Negative grabbed his friend and walked on people’s heads and bodies — anything to get away!_

“Are you two okay?” the Error asked. He noticed how Scar shook at the memories and Negative’s expression darkened. “Can I help you?”

The friends shared a look. They hadn’t studied their charge yet and had no idea what to expect from him. Because Butterfly was intent on helping everyone as well — it’s just that his help involved terrifying transformations into insects. Kindness varied greatly in its manifestations. Perhaps, back in Runner’s home Multiverse they considered it kind to mutilate him instead of killing him. What a _great_ way to help, right? Void damn them!

“And how do you intend to help?” Negative asked and enjoyed watching the Error’s face twist in confusion. “Ha! Just as I thought, there’s nothing you can do to help.”

Saddened, the Error hung his head low, and his tail that had been wagging only a minute ago, flopped down next to his feet like a dead snake.

Scar scratched at the back of his head, then considered the existence of immortal fleas and stopped tormenting his poor bones, having recognized the itch to do something.

“Cheer up.” He sat down next to the Error and said as cordially as he was capable of: “We’re both slackers with a lot of free time on our hands, so we’ll help you remember.”

He was instantly met with a look full of suspicion: “Why would you want to help me?”

“Just because.” Negative sat down on his other side.

The Error tucked his tail between his legs and shrunk, feeling trapped. They surrounded him on both sides, and he had no idea what to expect. He didn’t believe in random acts of kindness, so now he expected there to be a catch.

“We’re just curious what kind of creature you are,” Scar added. “We’ve never seen anyone like you. That is, what were you doing in the darkness and why were you turning into stone? After all, you seem to have found your goal. Then why weren’t you pursuing it?”

The Error would’ve liked to know that as well.

He looked to the left, to the right, felt a prickle of horror at the sight of both of his benefactors — both looked highly questionable — and let out a heavy sigh. What did he have to lose?

“Welp, I’ll be counting on you then.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to [Neutralcybertrn](https://twitter.com/Neutralcybertrn) for beta-reading this chapter!

As they were leaving the apartment, they came across the Lust from before once more — only now he wasn’t quite alive. The glassy gaze of the bot followed the trio until they walked out into the staircase, practically burning a hole in their backs with how empty the soul behind it was.

The Error shot a look back, met this stare and shuddered. He was still struggling to grasp where he was and what he’d done to deserve this.

Out, beyond the walls of the building, he was faced with an abundance of other people and pressed himself against Scar, which earned him a surprised “Eh?”

“Doesn’t seem to suffer from haphephobia.” Negative nodded, as if to confirm his own conclusions. “Relax, tails. No one here gives a damn about you. Unless you start something first, you’re as good as non-existent in the residents’ eyes.”

Except Negative was wrong. Everyone kept turning around to stare at the Error, watch him walk through the streets. Some looked tense, others seemed scared — but everyone was giving the trio a wide berth.

Scar’s eyelights vanished. The Error was still clinging to him and was about as tense and fearful as the people around them.

“Negative, what’s wrong?”

Negative could feel the crowd’s tension but, just like his friend, couldn’t tell what provoked it. He glanced at the quivering bundle of black bones and covered him with his own aura. Everyone around them instantly forgot all about the Error and turned away, going about their business once again.

“Huh.” The negative Dream fixed the Error with a heavy look and said: “I think it’s best if we move to the edge of the residential area.”

Scar eyed the Error, disgruntled and very much aware whose fault it was that they were leaving the center: “Yeah, being the center of attention isn’t our cup of tea. That’s more of a Mettaton’s thing.”

The Error didn’t comment on what had transpired — only shook, pressing closer to the mutilated Ink. He relaxed only once they reached the edge and walked out into an empty area that looked a lot like a patch of Ink’s home Void.

“So.” Scar shook the Error off himself, and the black skeleton instantly backed away a bit. “Care to explain why creep the residents out so much?”

“How should I know?” The Error held his tail in his hands, dug the sharp fingertips into the thin bones. “I don’t remember any of them!”

“What Scar is trying to say,” Negative crossed his arms, “is that they can feel that you’re dangerous.”

The Error stood there, ramrod straight, eyes filled with fear and confusion. He held his tail in a death grip, mumbling: “Me? Dangerous? That’s crazy! I can’t be dangerous! I’ve never wanted to hurt anyone!”

“Never wanted to hurt anyone, huh?” Negative tried not to stress the black skeleton further and even put his tentacles away in an attempt to look less threatening. “I didn’t either.” He was talking slowly and quietly, forcing the Error to listen closely. “My Multiverse was ordinary. Unmemorable. It had the usual set of well-known characters and trite events.

“However, the Creators wanted to spice up the familiar muck with a tragedy — and one day they succeeded. I killed my own brother.” His voice hitched. “I’ve never wanted to hurt him, but I did, and he died in my arms.”

Silence fell upon them. Caught off guard by the confession, the Error needed a moment before he dared to break it: “Do you regret it?”

“Yes, I do. I not only killed my brother — I devoured his soul in an attempt to rectify the sin that I’d committed. But you’re supposed to fix your errors in a way that won’t have you making new ones in the process, and, as it turned out, I wasn’t good at fixing errors.

“So now I have no brother, no world and no Multiverse. Now I’m just another resident of Zero Infinity. Neither of us wanted to hurt anyone. But we did.”

The Error’s eyelights vanished, and he looked as if he’d just entered a reboot — but he was actually stuck deep in thought, trying to accept the fact that at some point someone had suffered because of him.

Scar remained silent, and he would’ve stayed silent even longer if the Error hadn’t looked at him, expecting a similar story. However, the scarred Ink had no desire to share the pain he was hiding, so he snorted, saying: “Anyway, you get it. Even if you fucked up here or there, it doesn’t make you a champion of evil. So quit going hysterical on us and try to remember why the people here might be so scared of you.”

“I don’t scare you two though, right?”

Negative and Scar shared a look and burst out laughing.

“Sorry, sorry!” Scar wiped away a stray tear. “We’re a special case.”

“Not even Nothing scares us,” Negative said.

That was a lie. Nothing _did_ scare them big time — enough that their teeth chattered and they felt faint with fear — but these two still stood beside him, not daring to leave, and watched him devour Butterfly. Meanwhile they were busy killing the nearing butterflies and protecting the other survivors. They grew a lot stronger as a result — and no one could scare them after that.

“Who’s Nothing?”

The question made the duo share a look — one of surprise this time.

“How can you not know who Nothing is?” Scar was baffled. “It’s like not knowing what Zero Infinity is. He’s an integral part of it.”

“So who is he?” The Error couldn’t quite understand the others’ reverence at the mention of the mysterious person if he had no idea what inspired said reverence.

“He’s the devourer of Multiverses,” Negative said.

The Error’s eyelights blinked out of existence for a second. Something clicked inside his head — and it wasn’t a pleasant feeling.

“Devourer?” he echoed.

“Roughly speaking, yes.” Scar sat down on the ground, trying to feel the chill of the surface, but the ground of Zero Infinity was neither cold nor warm. Perhaps, it was best to be grateful that the ground simply _was_. “Nothing comes to the Multiverses that fail to meet expectations, and turns them into nothing.”

“Fail to meet expectations?” The Error tensed. “Whose expectations?”

“We don’t know.” Negative sat down on the floor as well. “The Creators’, most likely. Though, perhaps, They have nothing to do with this. No one knows for sure. But Nothing never claims prospering Multiverses — only ones that are ready to collapse. Ones that jeopardize their cluster’s existence.”

“You’re an Error — a destroyer of worlds — so this should be a familiar concept,” Scar noted condescendingly.

The black skeleton was having a hard time coping with the bulk of information dumped on him. Finally, he caught his breath, looked away and mumbled: “Editor.”

They didn’t quite catch that. “What?”

“I never was a destroyer! I was an editor!” He got emotional then, words spilling out of him in haste: “Why do you even assume that just because I’m an Error, I’m a destroyer? Aren’t there any creator Errors? I think I once saw one with a paintbrush. Why do you assume I’m the same as the rest??? I’ve never wanted to hurt anyone and I never will!!!”

“Whoops.” Scar scratched the back of his head. “Well, that’s a surprise.”

“Calm down, tails, we didn’t mean it that way and we’re not accusing you of anything. We’re just trying to figure out what kind of a bog you’re drowning in.”

The Error held his head in his hands and finally sat down on the ground as well. He looked beyond the empty space’s border — towards the residents, who ran around, went about their business and… feared him. Then he looked at this duo, who remained calm and fearless.

“And you want to keep me company?” The Error found it in him to chuckle. “What if I’m some kind of scary creature, like Nothing?”

“In that case we have the chance of becoming your Annihilator.” Scar snorted, noticed the look of surprise on the Error’s face and shrugged it off. “That’s local folklore. Don’t mind it.”

“He’s right.” Negative brought his tentacles out in the open again. “We don’t really care which bog to splash in. So let us introduce ourselves once more. I’m Negative. A negative Dream. A brother-killer. Here to aimlessly waste an eternity.”

Negative held out his hand for a handshake.

“I’m Scar. A tyrant Ink. One who watched his home Multiverse perish with a smile on his face. I’m wasting my eternity without a goal in mind as well.”

Scar held out his hand too.

The black skeleton awkwardly put a hand into each of the offered ones and squeezed: “I’m Error. An editor.” He glanced at his long fifth limb. “You can call me Tail. You keep calling me ‘tails’ anyway. I’ve forgotten quite a bit, and I hope you’ll help me remember things.”

The friends shook each other's hands, not yet aware, what turning their duet into a trio would result in.

They didn’t instantly become a team. Scar and Negative weren’t too hard on the new member of their group, but they still treated like he was an optional part of it — an incompetent newbie. Though later they would remember that the person before them had gone through a long journey, which inspired respect. And then they would think of how he broke down during the most recent leg of his journey — and ask him why. That tended to turn into pestering: “Have you remembered anything?”

He had not. Tail barely managed to organize his thoughts and arrange the scraps of memories he did have. According to them, back in his own Multiverse Tail was an upstanding guy: he only edited the worlds and preferred to get along with others rather than fight them. However, others often manipulated him, which put a great mental strain on him. Then his Multiverse collapsed. Tail couldn’t remember what caused it, but he story painted a colourful picture of his time spent inside the darkness. He got lucky: a pathlighter found him and brought him to a residential area. But what happened then?

Tail kept thinking until his head hurt, but his memories remained a hazy set of images he couldn’t make sense of. The story had a blank spot, which kept Tail from figuring out how he ended up in the middle of darkness once again with a strong desire to die. According to him, he was never prone to such thinking: Unlike many Errors, he was pretty fond of life and living. He would’ve fought for his chance to keep living as he had always wanted to keep helping others.

So why…?

Negative and Scar only shrugged at that. They’d seen a lot of different alternates and weren’t easily surprised. They even saw a star Error once — back during the Butterfly incident. And there was also an Error who got fed a bunch of golden apples — poor guy.

“We’ll figure this out eventually,” Negative promised.

He was currently choosing where they should go. He didn’t want to return to the residential area: the looks their new teammate was getting were way too odd. Hanging around the edges didn’t seem particularly appealing either. This cluster had nothing interesting to offer anyway.

“Okay, let’s keep moving,” Negative ordered.

Scar eagerly agreed, and Tail… He didn’t care either way. It seemed as if he hadn’t quite regained his bearings yet and was willing to go wherever he was taken to — even to a slaughter. He obediently got up and joined the tiny group of travellers, wagging his tail.

For wayfarers a journey from one residential area to another was only a matter of the steps they had to take — but for everyone else it was an adventure all on its own. Dark adventure. In order to pass through the darkness, they needed to catch a pathlighter — and there were only two ways to do that. Option number one: Waiting for a pathlighter to bring someone to the residential area and snatch them. Option number two: Asking a wayfarer to bring them a guide.

“Do you know how to catch pathlighters, Tail?” Negative asked.

“I’m not even sure I know who they are,” the black skeleton said, caught off guard by the question.

“Great,” Scar drawled and looked around. Even if there was another wayfarer in this area, they were too far away from here — which meant they’d have to search for newcomers.

“Okay, so we’re going to walk along the edge, looking out into the darkness. The light we’re looking for can be seen ten miles from here — maybe more. If you see any light at all, tell us immediately.”

As it turned out, Tail had a keen sight: they barely took a hundred steps before he stopped in his tracks and pointed into the darkness: “I see a light.”

His two companions had to stare intensely in that direction to notice the tiny spot of light.

The wait took a long while. They had the time to discuss a lot of random nonsense and notice a couple of acquaintances. The duo didn’t greet them though, only nodded at them — as if to say, _we saw you and you saw us_. Those people would’ve loved to come closer, but whenever they tried, they would stop midway for some reason, stare at Tail for a moment, then leave.

Finally, a confused and terrified Horror came out of the darkness — led by a Gaster of all people.

“What a rare specimen.” Negative curled a tentacle around the pathlighter and addressed the Horror: “Pardon, but you should go further into the residential area. You can figure things out on your own. Bye.”

The poor newbie watched the group walk into the darkness, his expression pained, and reluctantly headed in the direction he was given. He kept gripping his axe like a lifeline as he struggled to pull himself together after the nightmare he’d been through.

The travellers couldn’t care less about his problems though. They plunged into the darkness like veteran divers, and walked forward without a particular direction in mind. Experience had taught them that sooner or later they’d come across a residential area. Whether it happened sooner or later didn’t really matter.

Tail kept staring out into the darkness, curious, and he shuddered when he realized the darkness was staring back at him. Or was it _into_ him? And it must’ve seen something terrifying within him, because it avoided him like the plague. It didn’t even find the light of the pathlighter as off-putting as the black skeleton’s aura.

Scar side-eyed Tail from time to time, having noticed the darkness’s behavior, but held back from asking — unlike Negative, who decided to say:

“It seems like we’ll have to stick to the edges of the residential areas. Apparently, you,” he pointed at Tail, making him shudder, “are too alien even by wayfarer standards.”

“Is it bad?” asked the black skeleton as if he wasn’t sure what the answer was.

Though, as it turned out, Negative wasn’t sure about it either: “I don’t know. It’s up to you.”

Scar elbowed Tail in the side: “In other words, as long as you don’t want to hurt us, we won’t consider you a beast of Zero Infinity. Even if you — essentially — would be one. Got it?”

This was enough to cheer Tail up, and he straightened up, his fifth limb wagging to express his joy. “Thanks.”

The journey through the darkness was neither entertaining nor scary. For experienced travellers it looked like a monotonous dark path that dark shadows scattered away from in fear. Nothing was happening, and the silence seemed immutable. However, the deeper into the darkness the travellers walked, the more spots of light they saw. Those were pathlighters wandering about in search of survivors. Some of them walked right past the group, paying no attention to the visitors. Some of them weren’t alone, leading scared or crying monsters and humans towards the residential areas.

Tail looked at the pathlighter he and his group were travelling with. The Gaster looked distant. His soul was shining brightly inside the lamp, like a fire yearning for freedom — but in reality the soul was content to stay right where it was. The Gaster was calm and ready to work as a guide for as long as this cluster existed.

“What’s a pathligher?” Tail asked.

Scar shrugged instead of an answer, unwilling to discuss such an odd subject.

Negative did reply, but his response created more questions than answers: “When people can no longer shine for themselves, they become pathlighters.”

“What do you mean?”

Just like Scar, the dark Dream shrugged: “Who knows? One day you’ll just come across a person, who realized the hopelessness of their existence. They can never become a part of another Multiverse, can’t build a peaceful life for themself here in Zero Infinity, and don’t want to become a statue or a bot — much less a part of the amalgamation. Such people walk out into the darkness, where they rip their souls out of their bodies and refuse to _be, live, exist_. They rid themselves of sadness and joy and become a light.”

“Lightning bugs, all of them,” Scar muttered. “Flying around without a care, just like them. They don’t care about anything but searching for the people lost inside the darkness and leading them to the nearest residential area.”

“So they’re kind of soulless? Even though they have a soul?”

“Something like that.” Scar made a face. “But even my soulless alternates had more power over their desires. These bobbleheads, however, are on Zero Infinity’s leash. But they’re the ones who made that choice, so there’s no point in feeling sorry for them. Perhaps, that’s what was best for them.”

They walked in silence for a while.

Sometimes they came across stone statues and had to walk around them. Tail gave them an especially wide berth. And when he saw a statue of himself, he threw his tail up and hissed like an actual cat.

“Maybe he’s from a world that’s neighbours with a cat-themed cluster?” Negative guessed with a chuckle.

“Let’s give him some catnip and find out,” Scar suggested in a conspiratorial whisper.

Tail snorted at them exactly like a disgruntled cat, prompting Scar and Negative to choke on laughter.

All of a sudden, a stamped parcel tied with string fell on the ground in front of them. The box cried “Ow!”, and a small skeleton jumped on top of it seemingly out of nowhere.

“Whoops, wrong address,” he said and stamped his foot against the top of the box.

And instantly fell into nowhere.

The black skeleton’s eyes bulged: “Who was that and how can he use magic?” He ran up to the place where the parcel had been just moments ago and examined the spot from all sides but found no holes or pentagrams — nothing unusual.

“That’s Postman.” Scar too was staring intensely at the spot where the mysterious skeleton appeared only to vanish. “He’s a Blueberry, who found his calling in delivering others’ words. A spry little echo flower. He can deliver a message to any place within Zero Infinity. He can also deliver packages. They say that it’s possible to send yourself inside one, but Negative and I would rather not try it. Postman’s ability to bypass the whole ‘no magic in Zero Infinity’ law seems strange at best.”

“But _how_?” Tail struggled to understand.

“Some wayfarers have extraordinary skills and talents.” Negative pulled their pathligher closer to the spot everyone took interest in. “It isn’t magic in the ordinary sense of the word. It’s more of an unusual trait. For example, Annihilator can enter any Multiverse with unnatural ease — and he doesn’t require an invitation or a pathway. Butterfly could turn anyone into a butterfly. Dollmaker can create souls. Postman can travel to any point of Zero Infinity if he so desires. And you,” he pointed at Tail, “you can do something unique as well. You just don’t remember it.”

Tail shuddered. He didn’t want to remember what kind of ability he had. After all, he must’ve chosen to forget everything for a reason. He didn’t want to think of how he’d _have to_ remember sooner or later. He’d rather it was later.

However, Zero Infinity must’ve had other plans for him, because it didn’t take his wishes into consideration.

There was a commotion in the residential area they arrived at. The trio couldn’t tell what was going on from a distance, but the residents were restless and exceptionally noisy as they crowded at the edges of the light zone. When the travellers came out of the darkness, the crowd shrank away from them, as if they were cursed. The people only relaxed once they got a better look at the group.

Someone dared to throw a boot at Negative out of fear, which prompted an outraged, “What the hell?”

“Sorry,” squeaked a tiny Papyrus. He ran up to Negative and held out his hands, demanding his boot back.

“Please, forgive him.” A Toriel came over after the kid. She looked like she’d come from a Fell-universe, but had a softer demeanor than her alternates and was more polite. “Nothing entered the residential area. The children were scared, so we had to move to the edge.”

About fifty or so kids confirmed her words. They were all screaming about how scary the “mister with a thousand faces” was.

“A thousand faces?” Tail echoed, confused.

“In a nutshell: Everyone sees Nothing differently — and usually everyone would see themself in him. I guess, that’s why the kids called him that,” Scar explained.

Tail didn’t seem to hear him though. He shrunk, shivering, and seemed to be dissociating from reality. While Scar made attempts to bring him back to his senses, Negative conversed with the Toriel.

“We’re travellers, wandering about for our own enjoyment. And you?”

“I am in charge of an orphanage. You can call me Mother. Our building is closer to the center of this area.” She waved her paw in the general direction she was talking about.

“Kids aren’t a rarity in this area, I see.”

“No, they are not.” Toriel agreed. “Among the people pathlighters bring, one in ten is a child.”

With stats like these it was a wonder that the residential area hadn’t turned into a giant kindergarten yet. There weren’t that many children around though, so Negative asked: “What do you do with all of them? Pickle them?”

Toriel laughed, her fangs showing: “No, I prefer them raw. But seriously, this area is quite lucky. It is neighbors with a tree-type cluster, and we manage to place the kids into different versions of the Multiversal worlds.”

“Oh!” Scar was surprised — enough to even stop pestering Tail. “I didn’t know there was a cluster of tree-type worlds nearby. Those are usually huge, and the residents are countless.”

“Indeed it is.” Toriel smirked. “You are at the edge of an enormous cluster. There are millions of residential areas here. In the time it takes you to visit all of them, a hundred new wayfarers will appear in Zero Infinity.”

The scale of the place was terrifying.

Negative let out an appreciative whistle: “It sounds like Nothing will have to take up residence here. Even he won’t be able to clean up all the branches quickly.”

They didn’t bother drawing this conversation out any longer. The trio of friends headed towards the center of the residential area, and the mother of the huge family remained at the edge.

Tail didn’t quite come back to his senses until they left the semi-dark border behind and saw the patchwork of the residential area, crawling with people, before them. The residents looked overly twitchy but kept going about their business.

There was none of Nothing’s aura in the air.

Scar voiced his thoughts: “He’s probably taking care of trash.” Seeing the black skeleton’s expression grow conscious once more, he asked: “Where do you think he is?”

“You sound as if you’re looking for him.” The Error looked around warily. His long tail was quivering in fear. “Personally, I have no desire to meet him.”

“Coward.” Scar crossed his arms. “We’ve already told you: he’s not bad…”

“Shut up, Scar.” Tentacles wrapped the shivering Tail in a hug and awkwardly patted him on the head. The terrified skeleton responded by pressing himself closer to Negative, seeking the other’s comfort. “Can’t you see he’s scared? What if they met in the past, and that meeting didn’t result in any positive memories for either of them?”

But Scar did not, in fact, shut up. Instead he took note of the other’s guess and suggested: “If they met and their previous encounter got engraved into our black friend’s brains so deeply that he’s scared of Nothing even despite the amnesia, then perhaps, if he meets this giant of infinity, he will remember himself?”

To Tail’s utter terror, Negative actually considered it: “That could work.”

“Don’t!” the victim of friendly aid managed to squeak before he was subdued and dragged off.

“Hey! Does anyone know where Nothing is?! We need to introduce him to our friend!” Scar shouted, scaring the nervous residents into scuttering to their hiding places like rats.

Tail would’ve loved to join them, but the duo had too good of a grip on him.

“Damnit. I can’t see Annihilator anywhere either. Which means, he’s definitely on a job. We’ll have to wait for those two here.” By “here” Scar meant the nearest bench in this patch of land that was reminiscent of Hotland.

He opened a dimensional window to KamiTale. Inside that Multiverse, the Error was once again playing his little secretive games with the Dream; the Nightmare was all over the place, and the people who normally made up his gang in other Multiverses, had mutated into some kind of demons here.

Bit by bit, Tail stopped stressing out as much and even got into the action happening on their improvised screen. Though when he saw the Error give his blood to the Ink, followed by the Ink losing his soul, he felt his chest ache and asked Scar:

“Does it hurt you to watch yourself?”

“That’s not me,” Scar replied curtly and pointed towards the crowd bustling beyond the patch of land the trio had settled on. “Not a single one of those Inks is me. I’m here, sitting with you. The others and I only share a likeness. And you…” He looked at the black skeleton and asked: “Are you like this Error? Do you feel related to him?”

Tail took a closer look at the extraordinarily collected, somewhat eerie and extremely determined god — and suddenly nodded: “I think, we’re alike. But, just like you said, it’s only a likeness.”

Their conversation died down then. They continued to watch the adventures of their alternates and wait… wait… wait… and hold down Tail, who kept shuddering every time someone walked by.

The travellers had no idea how they expected a meeting between Tail and Nothing to go down, but they couldn’t have suspected it would turn into a tragedy for this residential area.

An Error wearing tatters showed up not far from the bench. He took a single step forward and collapsed, exhausted. The words hovering around his body — “ANNIHILATION” — slowly multiplied to blanket his body.

He was followed by someone indescribable. He walked up to the fallen Error and all of a sudden looked straight at Tail.

He had no eyes, but Tail knew with utmost certainty that this creature was staring straight at him — staring deep _inside_ him. It saw the things he hated about himself, the things he rejected and hid away from others’ eyes. And Tail saw himself inside it: a cut-out silhouette in space that had his shape — a silhouette guilty of causing numerous deaths, a silhouette that had devoured billions of worlds.

Something clicked inside his head, and everything he’d been hiding broke free.”

Negative found himself no longer strong enough to hide the aura of the black skeleton — but who could’ve been strong enough to hold a broken dam together with their bare hands?

Scar was off the bench in a heartbeat, backing away. Negative recoiled as well, holding up his sharp tentacles defensively. Someone really scary was left to sit on the bench alone, and his aura instantly soaked the whole residential area, mingling with the suffocating terror of Nothing’s aura.

Humans and monsters ran away from the residential area only to get lost in the darkness and die. Dozens, hundreds, thousands victims…

But Scar and Negative didn’t notice any of that. Hell, they weren’t even looking at Nothing. No, their eyes were glued to the suddenly _different_ Tail. He had turned into the epitome of terror. Eerie lights lit up inside his eyes, like flames flickering inside a burning building’s windows. His teeth grew longer and sharper, looking like murder weapons now. His face looked downright predatory. Claws appeared on his hands, and his tail grew a sharp spike on its end.

And this embodiment of fear let out a deafening howl, dashed off towards the border of the residential area and disappeared in the darkness.

Nothing fixed the remaining duo of friends with an intense look and suddenly pointed in the direction Tail had run off in: “Take good care of him.”

How did one describe the voice of a being that didn’t have a body — a being that existed and did not all at the same time. The friends didn’t even bother trying. They just nodded like bobbleheads and tore off the spot to chase after the runaway Error.

Nothing bent down, picked the exhausted Annihilator up and disappeared into yet another Multiverse.

Despite the shock of the things they’d just seen, Scar and Negative remained stubborn, and they were determined to find their new friend. The duo was consumed by equal parts fear and curiosity — and, damnit, _Nothing himself_ asked them to do this. How could they say no to participating in something so extraordinary?

“Where did this idiot go?” Negative asked, annoyed, as he looked around for Tail.

“Into the darkness!”

“We won’t be able to find him there!”

“We won’t but he will!”

They grabbed a shivering Annoying Dog on the go and forced the pup to become their sniffer dog: “Come on, doggy! You have a chance to serve a cause of infinite importance. Search!”

The Dog could only nod, agree to everything and search. How could he say no, when they threatened to make him into a kebab and leave him in the darkness for the amalgamation’s amusement?


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for this chapter: brief descriptions of mutilations, implications of past torture.
> 
> Special thanks to [Neutralcybertrn](https://twitter.com/Neutralcybertrn) for beta-reading this chapter!

Meanwhile, the long-tailed demon was running deeper and deeper into the darkness. The amalgamation scampered out of his way in fear. Pathlighters made way for him, and wayfarers watched him go with wonder in their eyes. Stone statues turned to shrards under his strong paws.

Running blindly had to end up in a collision sooner or later — and it did. Two black creatures rolled on the ground, howled at the short burst of pain, pulled apart and stared at each other, eyes wild. One of them was Runner, mutilated by his shackles; the other was a beast. The beast was horrified by what he saw: frayed bones; crooked, badly-healed fractures; a gag in the mouth and metal rods in the arms. Runner’s eyes lingered on the claws, fangs and glowing eyes of the beast. A spark of understanding glimmered in his eyes for just a moment, but it was instantly washed away by a wave of panic — and then he was upright again and running away in fear.

Tail remained sitting on the ground. He felt drained of emotions. He remembered everything, and now these memories were weighing him down. Things had _just_ started to get better; he’d finally found someone who wouldn’t run away from him in fear — and he just _had_ to scare them.

Would they fear him as well now?

Why wouldn’t they? He was scared of himself too, after all.

Tail didn’t even consider going back. Why would he do that? Just to see fear in others’ faces again? He slowly trudged forward — until a patch of light gave him pause. Odd. It was too dull to be the light of a residential area or that of a pathligher.

Driven by curiosity, Tail plodded in the direction of the dull light and soon realized what he was looking at. It was an oasis — also known as “transit point”. These were patches of safety ranging from a few feet to a few miles in width. Sometimes these patches were even made to be similar to residential areas and had some amenities.

Not this patch though. The closer Tail got, the better he could see that this oasis was tiny, and there was nothing there but a lone person looking through a dimensional window.

The person turned out to be a female version of Ink. She sat there, void of emotions, and watched the slowly unfolding branch of events in one of the countless Multiverses. She looked artificial in a way, as if she was one of the statues — only made of living tissue. Tail remembered these kinds of people being called bots.

He was about to walk away when the girl turned to face him and looked him over. The black monster expected to see fear on her face and hear her scream, but the girl wasn’t afraid of him.

“Hello.” Her voice turned out to be surprisingly melodious. “Are you looking for a new home too?”

Tail shuddered and looked down at himself: at the beast capable of devouring entire Multiverses — at the beast who’d already devoured a few.

He shook his head: “There’s no place for me anywhere.”

“Nonsense. There’s a place for everyone. You just need to find it.”

“Don’t you see?! I’m a beast!” Tail roared, but his outburst didn’t scare the soulless creature in the slightest.

“I only see yet another Error — lost, scared and confused. A beast?” She sounded condescending then: “You’ve still got a long way to go to become one, kitten.”

If Tail had fur, it would’ve been standing on end, yet in spite of his outrage, he felt warm inside too. This meant there were still people, who weren’t scared of his terrifying essence.

The girl patted the “kitten” on the head and turned to face the dimensional window again.

“I’m looking for a new home,” she said. “And one day I’m going to find it. But you should probably keep moving forward. You’re strong enough to take on the long path ahead of you.”

Tail hung his head low. For him, moving forward meant becoming a devourer of worlds and bringing death to entire Multiverses.

“And what if I don’t want to follow that path?”

The girl didn’t get the chance to reply. She looked off into the darkness and smiled as she said: “I think they’re here for you.”

Distracted by their conversation, Tail didn’t notice a pathlighter’s light purposefully move in their direction — and at great speeds.

“Are those your friends?”

An eerie structure reminiscent of a one-eyed, one-legged deer with huge antlers, was closing in _fast_. It took some real effort to recognize _that_ as the negative Dream and one-eyed Ink he knew — and it was absolutely impossible to make himself believe that they’d remain his friends after having seen his beastly appearance.

But it really was them. Their speedier than normal movement was all thanks to the skateboard they’d stolen from a Fresh. The “antlers” turned out to be Negative’s tentacles, and a pathligher hung among them, playing the role of an “eye”. Scar too was hanging in the tentacles, holding a leash. A hysterically howling dog was hanging off the other end, regretting ever coming across these psychos.

“Taaail!” The black skeleton heard. “When we catch you, we’ll rip your head off.”

Tail didn’t want to part with his head, thank you very much. He was about to make a run for it, but the duo _did_ catch up to him, subdued him — and only then hugged him.

“Why did you run off? Did Nothing scare you that much?” Scar kept clinging to him.

“Wow, you’re a coward.” Negative chuckled.

They asked no questions and brought up nothing to upset him — and slowly, he started to calm down, returning to his more familiar appearance.

“Thanks,” he managed to force out. “For not thinking that I’m a beast.”

“You’ve still got a long way to go to become one.” Scar snorted — and the tone of his voice was so similar to the female version of Ink’s that Tail turned to look at her, thinking she’d tack on “kitten” to that sentence. But the girl was gone, and so was the dimensional window. She must’ve found a new home.

Without the window present, the oasis died. No one cared about that though.

“If anyone here is a beast, it’s me!” Negative puffed his chest out, summoning a crazed smile onto his face.

“No, no, no!” Scar sharpened a few pencils, prepared to use them as projectiles. “I’ll fight you for the title of the biggest beast!”

“Well, I’ll fight for it too, then,” Tail snarled jokingly.

The play-fight didn’t happen though. They were interrupted by an annoyed growl from below:

“Hey you, beasts of infinity! Get me back to the residential area!” The dog was terrified and _really_ wanted to be back to safety.

The “beasts of infinity” shared a look and laughed. They slowly headed back towards the residential area.

They were halfway there when Tail said, “I remember everything.” He wasn’t talking to anyone in particular. “I’ve never wanted to hurt anyone — but I did. I’ve never wanted to destroy worlds — but I did. I’ve never wanted to be the only survivor — but I was. I’ve never wanted to become a wayfarer — but I did. And I went further. I’m supposed to devour Multiverses — but I don’t want to.”

“If you don’t want to do it, then don’t,” Scar grumbled and caught his friend’s long tail in his hands, pulled on it as if it was a leash. “We’ll help you, if it comes to that.”

“Scar’s right.” Negative grinned. “We’re strong enough to bring you back to your senses.”

“Thank you… my friends.”


End file.
